Marijuana seizures on Colorado public land nearly doubled in 2017

Colorado’s forests and mountains aren’t just crowded with hikers and their selfie sticks. Last year, the long arm of the law pulled a record number of marijuana plants from public lands in the state.

In all, officers uprooted nearly 81,000 plants in 2017 from the depths of the state’s mountain ranges, compared to about 45,000 in 2016, according to data collated by a federal drug task force.

This was the third yearly increase in a row, according to the new report. In fact, the reported number of plant confiscations was 18 times higher in 2017 than it was in 2014, the first year of full legalization.